Autumn Calvert

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  • Are You Having Twins?

    Are You Having Twins?

    The second trimester was uneventful.  Actually, I felt better than I ever had!  I had the glow everyone talks about, I was showing, and I was a happy camper.  Asher had started moving around.  This was very cool.  There is nothing like getting kicked in the ribs and loving it.

    Then, I started growing at a fast rate.  Since this was my first pregnancy, I thought it was normal.  My 3D ultrasound was scheduled for my 29th week, and my sister, my nephew, and dad had come up to see the baby on the screen.  Asher’s godmother, Beverly, was also there to witness the wonder of Asher in my tummy.  We sat there waiting to be called back, and my hubby decided it would be a good time to go and visit a doctor client of his who was in the same practice.  Of course, about the time he disappeared into the back of the office, we were called back to the ultrasound room.  I kept telling all of the nurses, “Go and get my husband!”.  I wobbled over to the table and struggled my way up .  I was greased up and ready for the ultrasound to begin.  I kept saying, “We have to wait on Steve!”.  Obviously, she had another patient waiting, because she put the little wand on my tummy.  There he was.  I was speechless.  All I could think was, “Steve is missing it! He is missing it!”.  About that time, Steve entered the room out of breath.  Already on the screen was our first real look at our baby.  The baby was grinning and resting his head on his hand.  He still does this.  It was a heart stopping wonder.

    The ultrasound nurse made a statement about how large I was when I entered the room.  “Are we having twins?”  was her question.  “No”  

    During the ultrasound, my doctor had come in to take a look at the baby.  He said, “Thank God he looks like his mama”.  Too funny!  Once I made it into the room for my checkup, the doctor said nothing.  He just put the tape around my belly and said, “Humm”.  Not good.  Steve said, “What’s wrong?”.  “Autumn is measuring 45 weeks”  WHAT?  I was only 29 weeks pregnant?  A pregnancy only lasts 40 weeks!  I was measuring 45 weeks pregnant?  I mean, I knew I was big, but good grief!!!  “We need you to go back into the ultrasound room.”  

    I wobbled back into the room, and struggled back up onto the table.  I was excited to see my little fella again, but this was all business.  The doctor actually took over control of the machine.  After he was done, he told me to go back to my room. He would be right in.  He came in and told us I was carrying excess amniotic fluid.  This was dangerous because it put me at a higher risk of preterm labor.  It was also a sign there was something wrong with the baby.  What???  Not again!  He told me to stop teaching guitar and voice and to be on limited activity.  Basically, this meant I could go to the bathroom, go to the kitchen, and go to the chair.  I could barely get around with all of the pain I was in from carrying around tons of weight, so I was not terribly disappointed.  I was worried, though.

    The next 9 weeks of my life were spent in a chair.  I did manage to go out to eat a couple of times, but I was limited as to where I could sit due to my extra-large belly.  If I had a dime for each time I was asked whether or not I was having twins, Asher could go to college ten times over.  By the time I went into labor at 38 weeks, I was measuring 42 weeks.

    In the next segment, I will be talking about the actual delivery.  Those with a weak stomach may want to skip that one.

     

    READ the next blog in the series HERE

  • I AM HAVING A BABY

    I AM HAVING A BABY

    At first, it was surreal.  Then the exhaustion hit like a brick in the face.  Then the weird, strange, and outlandish happened.  Then, the fear the baby was not ok. Then the fear that I was not ok.  It was a ride.

    When I first noticed I was “different” was when I had to prod myself out of bed in the mornings. Emotion swings were at the top of the list.  Once, a lady started blabbing about a personal matter for me and my husband, and I lost it.  I was so mad and hurt that I sat in the bathroom crying at work.  My husband couldn’t take it.  He was there visiting, and he left.  I know…sounds like he is a real jackass, but he is a man, and a good one at that.  He had never seen me in such a state.  I had never seen me in such a state.  He absolutely had no idea as to how to handle the situation.  I know this now, but at the time, my emotions got worse.  I would have been happy to never see his face again.  I’m glad that did not come true!   

    I must admit, it was a bit dramatic. I was completely and totally out of control of the emotions that surrounded my heart.  It is hard to describe.  Fortunately for all, this only  happened 3 times.  Once, I laid on the floor of my closet crying.  In some ways, this was one of the most difficult times of the pregnancy.  I felt misunderstood and unloved.

    Another moment of shock came when I suddenly became sick at the site of the color green.  It was springtime in Alabama, and EVERYTHING was green.  My husband, on a trip back home from an outing, decided to take the “quick way” home.  There was nothing but farms and mountains covered in grass and trees surrounding me.  I was so sick, I turned green.  This “quick way” took us 45 minutes longer than normal.  The entire trip was farms, meadows, and mountains covered in a beautiful, sickening green.  Steve felt so bad.  By the time I got home, I creeped my way into the house and laid on the bed for the rest of the day.  Looking back on this out of the way drive, I laugh.  At the time though, all I could think was, “God, please please please take me home…I don’t care which one, just take me there!”.  

    Eggs.  The word that could make me gag at any moment.  Why eggs?  I have no idea.  Just the thought of the word “egg” made me want to vomit.  Oh, and my first experience entering my favorite restaurant was regretfully horrible.  The smells were so overwhelming I could barely stand in the foyer.  To this day, I still cannot eat at that restaurant.

    At 8 weeks, I began to spot.  Of course, I freaked out.  I called the doctor, and they called me in for an ultrasound.  Good news! The baby was fine.  Bad news…the baby had a cystic hygroma on it’s neck.  Not good at all.  These generally are a telling sign for down’s syndrome, heart defects, and a long list of bad things.  Our doctor suggested I have an amniocentesis done at 16 weeks.  The fear was gripping at me again.  I had to wait 8 weeks to find out if our little baby was ok.  Terminating the pregnancy was not an option for us, but we did want to be prepared.

    Steve took us on a mini vacation to the beach when I was 14 weeks.  I had just started to show a tiny bit, and I first felt the baby move then.  It was a weird sort of flutter.  I was crazy excited.  Some say this is gas pains, digestive issues, etc. which cause you to “feel like” the baby was moving.  No.  I felt the baby move, and gas and digestive issues do not feel the same.

    I still was anticipating the amnio.  I was very afraid it would hurt.  It did, but not too bad.  We found out some exciting news that day.  It was a boy!  First thing my mother said was, “Aw.  I wanted a girl!”  Too funny.  She still swears she didn’t mean it, but she said it.  My sister was pregnant too, and she was having a boy.  I guess mom just wanted to buy dresses and pick ribbons.  Oh well.

    The next week we received great news!  The baby was fine!  YIPPIE!  One down, and little did we know, many to come.  Thankfully, most of the rest of the bad stuff in the pregnancy happened to me.  We will get to that in the upcoming blogs.

    Until then…I must get out of here and play with my little man!

    Week 27
    27 weeks

     

    READ the previous blog in the series HERE

    READ the next blog in the series HERE

  • You are pregnant!

    You are pregnant!

    Bringing a child into this world is a difficult thing to do.  From the beginning, everything about who you are as an individual changes.  My story takes so many twists and turns it makes your head spin.  So, I decided to right a series of blogs about my experience.  Most of my friends know about all of these things, but not all of them. 

    Steve and I thought I would never be able to get pregnant.  We had gone through several channels to try, but nothing seemed to work.  We gave up.  Then, in December of 2008, my gynecologist found a polyp in my cervix.  He scheduled surgery to remove it, and while I was in surgery, he found a giant polyp in my uterus.  These polyps grew in a year’s time.   While I was recovering from surgery, Steve and I were vetoed from sex.  Apparently, this surgery can make you highly fertile.  We did as we were told.  That sucked.  Well, as soon as we were given the green light, life as normal resumed.

    We had been in the process of becoming adoptive parents through The Alabama Department of Human Resources.  I would love to tell you that this process was a simple smooth experience, but it was not.  It could be, but for us, it was just lots of road blocks and unreturned calls.  We pressed forward in hopes the nightmare of becoming approved would end.

    In the meantime, March of 2009 rolled around, and my friend Beverly invited me to a women’s conference at a local church.  Though I couldn’t make the whole weekend, I agreed to go to the Friday night service.  That day, I had this crazy urge to cut all my hair off.  I’ve had long hair for most of my life, and I wanted a change.  So, against my stylist’s advice, I said, “chop it off!”  She did, and I loved it.

    I got home, changed, and left for the conference.  During one of the breaks, I started thinking.  All of a sudden, I looked over at my friend and said, “You know, I’m 3 days late!”.  In her calm capable way, she told me to just be patient and wait.  The next day, still no period.   Not even a sign of a period!  I was so itchy to take a test, but my husband told me to just be patient and wait.   I am surrounded by level headed people…geeze!   On Sunday morning, I just couldn’t wait anymore.  So, without my husband’s knowledge, I took a test.  The pregnant line was so faint, you needed a magnifying glass to see it, but it was vibrant to me.  You see, I had looked at a bundle of negative tests over the years that left me in a crying mess on the bathroom floor.

    In my fantasies of this moment, I had imagined all types of cool ways to tell Steve I was knocked up.  Nice dinners, flowers with, “your going to be a daddy, again!” on them, and many other fantastic ideas.  However, after I saw the line, all I could do was shout, “STEVE, STEVE, STEVE…come HERE NOW!!!!!!”.  I think I may have freaked him out.  He ran in the room like the house was on fire.  Poor guy, in this state of urgency, had a pregnancy test shoved in his face with me saying, “THERE’S A LINE, RIGHT?  DO YOU SEE IT?????”   I was jumping from foot to foot waiting on his response.  He stared at the thing forever.  Then he said, “You know, I think it is!  Take another one!”.   I did as I was told.  Where all that pee came from, I do not know.  Again, the faint line was there, but a bit stronger.

    The excitement quickly turned to fear.  Oh, God, help me, I’m pregnant.  “Oh no…It’s there now, and it’s going to have to come out.  That’s gonna hurt.”  Funny,huh?  The one thing I had already started freaking out about was delivery.  Then I thought, “Is it a boy or a girl?”  In the furry, we called everybody.  We love to spread happy news.

    I called the doctor’s office on Monday, and they said to come on in for blood tests.  While there, they did another test.  The line was very light.  “Well, you could be pregnant.” was the response from the nurse.  What????  I was in tears.  She told me not to freak out.  The blood test results weren’t going to be back until Wednesday, so we had to wait.  Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait.  The story of my life.

    Tuesday, I received a phone call.  “Mrs. Calvert, I am happy to inform you that you have been approved as adoptive parents!”.  I thought, “You have to be kidding me.”  I told the lady I was excited, but it seemed as though my chances of being pregnant were high, and we would have to wait to start the search for a child.

    Wednesday:  Once the blood tests came back, we were again told to wait.  The levels were not where they were supposed to be.  More tears.  More needles.  More blood tests.  Then, finally, on the following Monday, we were told we were good to go!  You are definitely pregnant!  We were excited and called everybody again.

    Little did I know what was in store for my body.  Little did I know how my life would never be the same.  Little did I know that the worry I had in my past was nothing compared to the worry I would have as a mother.  Little did I know about a lot.

    The following 10 months were wonderful and interesting and scary.  I’ll be covering the entire story over the next few blogs.  

    Keep in mind, my pregnancy and birth was out of the normal by quite a bit.  I’m not sure it will be something a pregnant woman would want to read, but for all other women, it is interesting testimony of how a woman’s body can go crazy. It is also a testimony as to how strong the female body truly is. Women…we are beasts!

     

    The journey continues HERE!

  • Spaghetti Squash: How I love you.

    The diet, day 4…

    What are we going to eat???????  This question plagued me all day long. Dinner has become this large monster ready to take me down.

    I had seen on Dr. Oz this vegetable called Spaghetti Squash.  You cook it, and afterwards, you tear the meat out with a fork.  It becomes this fine spaghetti type substance.  It is actually pretty good by itself, but I thought we needed more zing.  So I whipped up a garlic, mushroom, tomato, onion, and pepper sauce and then toasted some rice bread.  You know, it wasn’t bad.  It was actually better than regular pasta!  Go figure.

    In other news, I am painting the studio tomorrow.  This is an activity I am looking forward to.  I know, crazy, right?  Well, Steve will have the baby, and I will have some time to listen to tunes and work.  Nice.  We have also decided to try to find GOOD homes for our dogs.  This makes me terribly sad, but we don’t have the time to be the dog owners we should be.  I’m praying hard that God will drop the right people into our lives who will enjoy our wonderful pets.  I can’t talk anymore about that…it truly breaks my heart.  I love my doggies.

    Well…that’s about it for today.  To do list item #5, “Write blog”, CHECK!

  • Two businesses and a baby

    When I married my husband, Steve, I knew I was marrying a struggling entrepreneur.  I was fine with it.  In fact, even when his business closed, I was excited to be married to someone who was self-motivated enough to try out new ideas.  A person who has that kind of drive is generally a prince or a pauper:  he has been both.

    Steve  is a haberdasher by trade.  He has been selling custom clothing for men since he was 16 years old.  After a couple of years of trying out new career options, he decided to give up and do what he loves.  Not only does he love it, but he is excellent at his craft.  Yes, I’m his wife and I’m proud, but this dude should be selling clothing on Rodeo Drive and not in Huntsville, AL.  He is really that good.  Ok..enough of the bragging…

    Steve opened his new store, “Traditions by Steve Calvert”, in April of this year.  It was about that time that I started considering opening a photography business, but I wanted to wait until he had gotten settled into his new spot.  By May, I sprung this news:  I’m selling all of my music equipment and buying photography equipment.  I’m starting my business.  He was amazingly supportive!  He always has been, so, I’m not sure why I was surprised.

    Our son, Asher, is now 10 months old.  He is a bubbling bundle of joy.  Due to both of us starting a new business, we are unable to afford daycare.  This presents daily challenges, but we have struggled our way through it and found a way to raise two businesses and a baby.  The rewards are endless, the challenges are astounding, and the excitement is unimaginable.  If someone tells you that running your own business is better than a “real” job, agree, but keep in mind that this is a road which is not easily traveled.  It is, however, well worth the trip!

    Steve’s Facebook page: Traditions by Steve Calvert (I’m working on getting him more internet marketing savvy 🙂 )

  • Yes…this is photography blog, but…

    I had to post about this diet we are on…again.  I am SHOCKED at how good/bad I feel.  My body is saying, “no more!”, and my mind is saying, “bring it on”.

    I am amazed at how strategic we are having to be about our meal planning.  No more, “what do you want for dinner” at 6:00.  Nope.  Now it is, “ok, what is for lunch and dinner tomorrow?”.  Though I would love to say this type of meal planning is coming naturally to me, I cannot.  Generally, my day is go, go, go, and I figure out food along the way.  This is why I am in bad health.  I know this.

    On a lighter note, I am finding some comfort in the fact I am becoming more disciplined.  Instead of thinking I can’t have certain foods, I am thinking about the things I can enjoy.  It is shocking how comfortable becoming uncomfortable is.  We, as Americans, are so used to having whatever it is we want whenever we want it, we have forgotten what we need.  The human body is made specifically for work.  This work cannot be accomplished without a healthy machine to back it up.  When we (I) have a body that is not feeling good, it isn’t going to “work”.  It is going to enjoy sitting in front of the T.V. and munching on a bag of chips.  When we (I) have a healthy body, the machine works instinctively.  It just does what it does, and it likes it.

    I am no where near where I want to be.  There is a LONG road ahead.  But, to get anywhere, you first have to get off your butt.  As far as what I am eating, I have gotten off my butt.  Thanks to inspiration from Dr. Asa Andrew, my husband and I are going to see our grandchildren be born…that is unless we are hit by a truck. 🙂